The present application relates to computing and more specifically to software, User Interfaces (Uls), methods, and accompanying systems for retrieving, arranging, and/or displaying data from a database.
Methods for arranging or displaying data from databases are employed in various demanding applications, including enterprise applications, such as Business Intelligence (BI), Performance Management (PM), Human Capital Management (HCM) applications. Such applications often demand efficient versatile mechanisms for searching data and displaying up-to-date data from different perspectives, and for enabling manipulation and organization of data without undue computational complexity and accompanying overhead processing.
Use of recent data used to illustrate search results and to perform data analysis (e.g., via illustrative graphics or analytics) can be particularly important in enterprise applications, where critical business decisions may depend upon accuracy of the data being analyzed.
Conventionally, enterprise applications (e.g., BI applications) cache or warehouse data retrieved from a database before analyzing the cached data. The cached data is then used for data analysis operations, e.g., displaying analytics. The cached data may represent OnLine Analytical Processing (OLAP) cubes, which may include dimensions and hierarchies established at software design time. During analysis, cube data may be sliced and diced via a calculation engine, or a database can be used to cache the data in physical storage, e.g., a hard drive.
However, if underlying data changes before the cache is refreshed, the cached data may be stale, i.e., expired and not reflective of current transaction data. Frequent refreshing of cached data may be prohibitively slow, requiring excessive computing resources.